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Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Finally... a week where I'm not battling the clock in an attempt to post the Technology Tuesday tutorial before midnight! I really didn't have much of a choice, though, since today is my wedding anniversary (one year married, nine years together!) and I don't think my husband would have appreciated me rushing out of our dinner reservations to come home and write up this post! I do love my blog, but I love my hubby more! :)

This week, the bloggers united to vote for how to add a pin it button to your blog!

I initially found this tutorial at Mayura4Ever, which has some amazing tutorials for bloggers. I kept the same steps, I just added pictures to make it nice and easy to follow!

I'm going to start uploading the tutorials to TPT since a lot of people have asked how they could download them. Click the link below to download this tutorial as a PDF!

I have to say, I was really surprised by this one coming up first in the poll... I have been so hesitant about putting up poll options that are specific to bloggers because I didn't think many people would vote for them. Boy was I wrong! I'll be sure to add more blogger tutorials to the poll in the future!

Note: This tutorial is hosted on Google Docs. To save it from there, just
open the file and click File > Download to save onto your computer!

As for next week, a special request came through via facebook, and I'm thinking it's something that a lot of people ill benefit from, so I'm going to add it to the poll right away...how to change colored clipart to black and white! And... I'm going to combine it with how to change a whole PDF to black and white!

Monday, July 30, 2012

I've been meaning to blog about classroom management for a while, but I just haven't gotten around to it! This week I am determined to knock off a few ideas from my To Do list and post some fun items!

Like many other teachers, I use a clip chart in my class. I updated my clip chart and uploaded it to TPT for only $2. And... it includes a parent letter to explain the chart to parents. Check it out by clicking the picture below.

I won't go into too many details on the chart above, but I do want to take some time to talk about one of my FAVORITE classroom routines... the most points!

This is one of my favorite routines because it’s really fast, and really easy! We all know how much kids love positive reinforcement and praise… it’s so easy to say “I love how so-and-so is sitting” And they just love getting little tangible items, like pencils and stickers. Now, what if we combine these two ideas, and each time you praised them get got something that was tangible? It sounds like it’s a lot of work, but it’s not! The tangible thing that they’re getting is actually “points!” My students respond to “So-and-so is getting points” far quicker than “I notice that so-and-so is sitting so nice!”

I never actually write down the points, I just constantly tell the class that I always remember who I gave points to. If you want to write it down, that’s totally up to you!

Anyway, back to the routine! At the end of the school day, I look at the list and pick one student to get the “most points” for that day and put a sticker next to their name. The graph-like nature of this management routine helps to keep the rewards totally fair. You can easily pick even the most challenging student to get the most points, by telling the class “Today so-and-so got so many points!”

Now… what do they “win” if they get the most points? I usually give the student with the most points two rewards:
1. They get to pick what job they want next week.
2. They get the first turn for the next activity that we do.

It’s easy and effective... and, it's FREE! I created three lists, one for up to 20 students, one for up to 25 students, and one for up to 30 students. Click the picture above to head to TPT to download it!

I'm linking this routine up with The Kinder Cupboard and 2 Crazy Texas Teachers!

Wednesday, July 25, 2012

The winner for part one was Mrs. Diane. Diane, I need your email address so I can send you the gift card for the items! Please leave a comment on this post with your email so I can send you your prizes!

Diane, send me your email so I can send you your goodies!

The winner for part two was Katie, who wanted to learn about how to "use technology effectively to manage grades, anecdotal notes, assessments, etc." Katie, that's a very interesting topic and I'm excited to blog about it. You can all expect a post next week (most likely on Wednesday) about this topic!

As for all of the other requests for a technology Tuesday post, I'll put them on my list and add them to the poll eventually! Thank you so much for your input!

Tuesday, July 24, 2012

You probably wouldn't believe me if I told you that at 2:00 this afternoon, this post was almost completely written! Then... I got sidetracked for eight hours (doing something fun and exciting for a friend... a surprise)! Now, here we are again, posting the Technology Tuesday post so close to the stroke of midnight that it's almost a Technology Wednesday post!

Regardless, I am SO excited by being able to blog about How to Make a Collage of Words in Any Shape! So many people know about Wordle which lets you make awesome "word clouds," but today we're going to play around with a fun website called Tagxedo, which in my opinion, is like Wordle on steroids!

This option swept the technology poll, leaving us with yet another landslide!

Note: This tutorial is hosted on Google Docs. To save it from there, just
open the file and click File > Download to save onto your computer!

I'm having such a hard time figuring out what to add to the poll! For now, I'm going to add one of my ideas, but after I pick a winner for Part 2 of my 500 follower giveaway, I'm going to start using some of those ideas in my poll!

In the meantime, I think I'll add a Blogger tutorial, how to add a "Pin It!" button to your blog!

Sunday, July 22, 2012

Do you want to help your students write their letters properly? Then these fun poems are the perfect answer! I have been meaning to post these alphabet writing signs for a white but I wanted to be sure to spruce them up for TPT! I am so excited by this new update and I can't wait to re-print them for myself later on!

The signs are available at TPT for $3.50, and if offers three different sizes for you to print. You can head there by clicking any of the pictures below!

And, here's a free frame for all of my fabulous followers! Be sure to click the picture below to load a higher quality version of the frame! You're more than welcome to use this frame in your TPT paid/free items, just be sure to give credit to me for creating it! Enjoy!

Thursday, July 19, 2012

Thank you to everyone who entered my flash giveaway yestererday! And the total was....

Be sure to click the picture above to see how I got all of those books for so cheap!!!

Congratulations to Laura at Mrs. Castro's class. She guessed 500 books! Be sure to check out her blog, she has wonderful ideas! Laura, leave me your email address so that I can send you the library set!

Now, for even more excitement... as I was counting my exciting purchase of 532 books, I noticed that I had almost that many followers!!! Drumroll please... I now have 500 followers! Whoo!

When I started this little blog in March, I never expected to gain that many followers ever, but I am so happy and blessed by every single one of you!

Leave a comment on one of my free items on TPT - leave one comment telling me which item you commented on.

Check out my other blog posts and comment on one of them - leave one comments telling me which post you commented on.

Blog about this giveaway - leave TWO comments giving me the link to the blog post.

Since I know so many of you follow me/found me because of my Technology Tuesday tutorials, I want to be sure to give you all a special addition to this giveaway! For this part, you can pick ANYTHING you want me to do a step-by-step tutorial on. You can pick something that's already in the poll or something entirely different. If I'm not sure how to do it, I'll try to figure it out! Just enter your info in the boxes below!

&amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Loading...&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;lt;/Thank you again to everyone! I'll be picking one winner for each part of this giveaway. It will end on Wednesday, July 25, 2012 at 5:00 PM EST! Good luck!

I know it's not Tuesday, but here's a special Technology Wednesday post! A few people commented about that annoying white border that pops up with you "print" a PDF of your PowerPoint. Here's how to get rid of it!

You can download this tutorial as a PDF by clicking this picture!

Note: This tutorial is hosted on Google Docs. To save it from there, just
open the file and click File > Download to save onto your computer!

Tuesday, July 17, 2012

Are you looking for a way to make your TPT cover page more colorful? Or to make a bright visual for your classroom? Well... it's much easier than you might think! For this week's Technology Tuesday (and I say Tuesday loosely as it's almost midnight... eek!), the winner was how to make your own frame in powerpoint!

This item won the poll by a large margin, but it does seem that some of the other options are becoming strong competitors! I can't wait to see what happens on next week's poll!

Now, without further adieu...

You can download this tutorial as a PDF by clicking this picture!

Note: This tutorial is hosted on Google Docs. To save it from there, just
open the file and click File > Download to save onto your computer!

And of course, here's the frame that I made as a freebie!

To save the files, just click the image to get to the higher quality
picture, then right click (or Mac: Ctrl + Click) to save the image
onto your computer!

Next week, I'm going to add how to make a collage of words in any shape you want!